


Measure of time

by andiownyousomuch



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: F/F, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-26
Updated: 2018-08-26
Packaged: 2019-07-02 17:21:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15801135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andiownyousomuch/pseuds/andiownyousomuch
Summary: I’ve been saving all my summers for you.





	Measure of time

**Author's Note:**

> For Touriko Week 2018, Day 1: “I’ve waited years for this.”
> 
> I finally overcame my writer's block.

(6:00 AM)

 

Portions of rice, mini-hamburguer, cherry tomatoes, steamed broccoli. A yawn at her throat, a satisfied smile on her lips, sleep trying to cover her eyes, for waking up one hour earlier.

Two bentos.

At lunch, Yoriko gives one of them to Touka, smiling. “It’s the same work, cooking for one or two people,” she says. “You have to eat better, Touka-chan.”

And Touka’s gaze pauses at the dark circles under Yoriko’s eyes.

She stops the words in her mouth from saying, _Yoriko, you don’t have to_ , and feels a warm breeze entering the classroom.

“Thanks, Yoriko.”

Her smile matches the other’s.

Touka’s full, and she hasn’t even started yet.

 

 

(a moment of distraction)

 

It seems like a painting.

Touka sitting by the window of the classroom, the sunlight hitting her features, the blowing wind revealing the eye that Touka keeps covered – a piece of her life, always hidden.

For a moment, the world is quiet; the pencil’s whispers against the paper and the teacher’s words can’t reach Yoriko’s ears.

 

 

(sunflower time lapse)

 

Yoriko is always looking at her: from east to west; stolen glances, when Yoriko thinks Touka isn’t looking; eye to eye, whenever they’re talking; and sometimes

sometimes

even if Touka isn’t there – she is _here_ , an image forever printed in Yoriko’s eyes,

even if Yoriko isn’t awake – she drags Touka into her dreams.

 

 

(a five minute break between classes)

 

Touka’s gaze is fixed on the paper in her hands, and Yoriko can’t help but peer at it. “Ah. You didn’t fill the formulary.” Touka gasps at her, surprised, and Yoriko tries to contain her giggle.

She fails, miserably.

And Touka’s glare only makes Yoriko laugh more. “I’m sorry,” she tries, “but your face, Touka-chan…”

The other girl lets out a sigh, the grimace easily dissolving into a smile in the corner of her lips – Touka can’t defeat Yoriko.

Touka lets a second sigh escape through her lips. “I don’t know what to write here. The future, huh?” For a moment, Touka’s gaze is lost, like she never entertained that thought before. Before Yoriko has time to ask what’s wrong, Touka’s back again, and says, “What you wrote, Yoriko?”

“Me?” The question catches her by surprise. Red blossoms in her cheek, but Yoriko anwers anyway. “Well… I thought about being a baker, but I’m not sure…”

“I think you would do great.” The red deepens on Yoriko’s skin. “Yoriko, I ate your food every week, I know you’ll do well.”

Yoriko laughs. “Thanks, Touka-chan.” She pauses. And then, “Hey, Toukan-chan?”

“Um?”

“We’ll still be together, right?” Yoriko clarifies, the fear shaking her stomach, “In the future.”

Touka looks at her, at Yoriko’s fingers closing in her skirt. “We will,” she says, and it’s more a wish than a certainty. “We will,” she repeats, because she wants it to be true. Because she hides so much from Yoriko and this, at least this, she doesn’t want it to be a lie.

 

 

(afternoon)

 

Sometimes, when they walk home together, side by side, their hands brush each other. Their palms meet, and Yoriko’s fingers fit in the gap between Touka’s fingers. Hand in hand, they walk, and Yoriko wishes that they never come home, that they keep walking on forever, so the moment when she’ll have to let go of this hand never –

They stop. Touka looks at her, the curve of her mouth upwards.

“See you tomorrow, Yoriko.”

Slowly, ever so slowly, Touka releases Yoriko’s hand.

“Bye, Touka-chan.”

_Please, don’t let go of me._

 

 

(the last day)

 

When the time comes, she’ll look back and wonder why she didn’t realize anything.

She’ll think and try to find out if Touka had left any clue of leaving her behind – a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes, a touch that lingers for a moment too long; anything.

It’s not that time yet, so, to Yoriko, it’s a common day: classes would be boring if it wouldn’t be for the littles notes exchanged between them, Yoriko makes Touka eat a little bit more at lunch, the walking home is always too short when they are together, and a promise of meeting again on the next day is made.

_\-- but not fullfilled._

When the time comes, she’ll look back and wonder: what she would do if she’d know it was their last day together?

Yoriko would take a picture of Touka with her phone, and Touka would be so embarrassed. Yoriko would take a picture of Touka with her eyes, blinking, and blinking her tears away. Her hand would linger just a little bit longer when handing Touka a note. Her head would rest against Touka’s shoulder, so Touka wouldn’t see her tears. Yoriko would hug Touka tightly, saying _thank you, I love you, touka-chan, don’t go, please don’t go._

Yoriko would ask Touka to, at least, say goodbye to her.

 

 

(24 hours after)

 

Yoriko sees the news, and goes to all the places she’d been:

To the school: she stays until the beginning of the second period, until she realizes that _Touka-chan isn’t coming_. She hates being the center of attention, but she gets up, ignoring the teacher’s yell, ignoring her classmates’s stare, and _runs_ –

… to the coffee shop: or what rested of it. Yoriko found debris, ashes, the scent of the asphalt after the rain, mixed with the smell of dried blood. The whispers of people fill the air. Touka’s always told her, _don’t go to my work place_ , and Yoriko thinks, shaking, _I shouldn’t have come here_ –

… and goes to Touka’s place: and there’re no plates with surnames, no one, no answer to her red knuckles against the door.

Eleven lost calls and counting, and the only answer she receives is _the number you've called is unavailable, please leave a message after the tone_.

Yoriko is so _angry_ —

With herself.

_Touka-chan._

_I was by your side and I hurt you,_

_And I didn’t even realize it._

Touka simply disappeared.

Is it really that easy?

They’d studied together,

they’d laughed and cried,

they’d stood side by side,

so why those days seemed so distant now?

Like they never happened.

Like Touka’d never been there.

Like Touka’d never existed –

_Touka-chan._

_Where are you?_

 

 

(interlude)

 

It becomes a habit. Yoriko searches for Touka in the middle of a crowd. Sees her in the neck of someone else, because of their short hair. Through the glass of each coffee shop. Takes stranger by their arms, calls them by her name.

And apologizes when sees that _it’s not her. Again._ Always apologizes.

Maybe it has always been a second nature to Yoriko. She was always looking at Touka; now, she’s always looking after Touka.

Like it’s her only direction.

 

 

(a moment)

 

… and one day. One day, Yoriko is walking along the street and sees a coffee shop she’s never entered before. The name, _:re_ , makes her curious. She’s not hopeful; all the hope she had was left in the doors of other countless shops. Still, she keeps the habit of trying every new coffee shop she finds.

So Yoriko enters. The low light, the books at a corner, the nostalgic smell of coffee, everything about that place makes something inside of her burn. That’s when Yoriko sees _her_. The waitress, with her back to her, a silhouette achingly familiar. The hair that brushes her neck, in a slightly lighter shade of blue.

The waitress turns around, at the sound of the opening door.

“Welcome-“

She stops. The word falls there, in the space amid them.

 _Ah_ , Yoriko thinks. _Her voice, her voice._

“…Yoriko.”

Her name.

“Touka-chan.”

She has missed it.

 

 

(i’ve waited years for this)

 

“So,” Touka says, resting the mug full of coffee on the table.

They are not in the coffee shop, but on the floor above. When Yomo, the most stoic and silent person she’s ever known, had turned to her and said, _“Talk with her. I’ll take care of the shop,”_ Touka had no arguments left.

So that’s why Touka has a mug in her hands and no words to say, and she’s in front of Yoriko, whom she’d left behind years ago.

“So,” she repeats, and she knows she’s being stupid, how many times she’d imagined that scenario, even before she’d disappeared, and ever since she’d known Yoriko, but she’s afraid, far too afraid. “…Yoriko. Do you know what I am?”

“I know. But…”

Touka’s palm is full of sweat. Her quickening pulse almost makes her drop the mug she brings to her lips. Touka decides to rest the mug on the table once more, for her own good.

“… I also know who you are, Touka-chan.”

Yoriko reaches Touka’s hand with her own. That nostalgic way of saying her name. The warmth of that hand. Yoriko gets up and walks to Touka, without letting go of her hand.

“Can we be together, Touka-chan?”

It’s her wish, too; but still not a certainty. Yet, this time, it could be true. This time, it doesn’t have to be a lie.

This time, she doesn’t have to lie about anything to Yoriko.

“Yes.”

Yoriko smiles.

“Can I hug you, Touka-chan?”

Touka answers with her arms around Yoriko, pressing hands against back and waist, face against the curve of her neck, and Yoriko wraps her arms around Touka, too.

Against her neck, just below her ear, Yoriko asks, quietly, “Can I kiss you, Touka-chan?”

Touka turns her head to Yoriko. There’s scarcely any space left between their faces, and she can feel Yoriko’s breath brush her cheek. This time, it’s her mouth that carries an answer to Yoriko's lips: _Yes, yes, yes._ And Yoriko kisses her back, and though Touka just had coffee, her taste is sweet, it’s the sweetest thing she’d ever had.

Their lips part. Foreheads touching, breathing her air. Touka traces Yoriko’s cheek with her thumb. Looks at her, open. Vulnerable.

“Aren’t you afraid of me?”

Yoriko lays a kiss on Touka’s eyelid, the one that’s used to be hidden. Backs away. Looks right inside of her both eyes.

“And you, Touka-chan? Are you afraid of me?”

 

 

(morning)

 

They wake up to each other‘s eyes, fingers of flour tracing slowly palms full of grains. The bed is warm. Life is simple: bread and coffee, that’s all they need.

 

 

(a lifetime)

 

_“Can I see your kagune, Touka-chan?”_

“Yoriko.”

_“Please.”_

_“…Okay. But maybe you won’t like it.”_

_“I doubt that, but okay, Touka-chan.”_

_“…”_

_“…”_

_“…There.”_

“--Ah.”

_“…”_

_“…”_

_“That’s it, Yori—“_

_“…”_

_“—ko. Why… why are you crying…? Are you okay--“_

_“No, Touka-chan… it’s just…“_

_“…”_

_“You look like an angel, Touka-chan.”_


End file.
